Nancy MarchandNancy Marchand (June 19, 1928 – June 18, 2000) was an American
actress. She began her career in theatre in 1951. She was perhaps most
famous for her television portrayals of Margaret Pynchon on Lou Grant
and
Livia Soprano on The Sopranos.

Contents

1 Early years
2 Career
3 Death
4 Filmography

4.1 Film
4.2 Television

5 Awards and nominations
6 References
7 External links

Early years[edit]
Marchand was born in Buffalo, New York, to Raymond L. Marchand, a
physician, and his wife, Marjorie Freeman, a pianist. She was raised
Methodist.[1] She graduated from the Carnegie Institute of Technology
(now Carnegie Mellon University) in 1949.[2]
Career[edit]
A talented member of the Actors Studio,[3] Marchand made her Broadway
debut in
The Taming of the ShrewThe Taming of the Shrew in 1951. Additional theatre credits
include The Merchant of Venice, Love's Labour's Lost, Much Ado About
Nothing, Forty Carats, And Miss Reardon Drinks A Little, The Plough
and the Stars, The Glass Menagerie, Morning's at Seven, Awake and
Sing!, The Octette Bridge Club, Love Letters, Man and Superman, The
Importance of Being Earnest, The School for Scandal, The Balcony, for
which she won a Distinguished Performance Obie Award, and Black
Comedy/White Lies, for which she was nominated for the Tony Award for
Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Play. She was nominated
four times for the Drama Desk Award, winning handily for Morning's at
Seven. She won a second Obie for her performance in A. R. Gurney's The
Cocktail Hour.
On daytime television, Marchand created the roles of Vinnie Phillips
on the
CBSCBS soap opera,
Love of LifeLove of Life and Theresa Lamonte on the NBC
soap, Another World. She also memorably starred as matriarch Edith
Cushing on Lovers and Friends, a short-lived soap opera.
On prime time television, Marchand was renowned for her roles as
patrician newspaper publisher Margaret Pynchon on Lou Grant—winning
four Emmy Awards as Best Supporting Actress in a Dramatic Series for
her performance—and matriarch Livia Soprano, mother of Tony Soprano,
on the
HBOHBO series The Sopranos, which earned her a Golden Globe Award
for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Series,
Mini-Series or Motion Picture Made for Television and a Screen Actors
Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama
Series. She appeared in many anthology series in the early days of
television, including
The Philco Television Playhouse (on which she
starred in Marty opposite Rod Steiger), Kraft Television Theatre,
Studio One, and Playhouse 90. Additional television credits include
The Law and Mr. Jones, Spenser: For Hire, Law & Order, Homicide:
Life on the Street, Coach, and Night Court. She played Hester Crane,
mother of Frasier Crane, on an episode of Cheers.
Marchand's feature film credits include Ladybug Ladybug, Me, Natalie,
Tell Me That You Love Me, Junie Moon, The Hospital, The Bostonians,
Jefferson in Paris,
The Bachelor Party (1957), Brain Donors, Reckless,
The Naked Gun, Sabrina, Dear God, and From the Hip (1986).
Death[edit]
Marchand suffered from both lung cancer and emphysema and died on June
18, 2000 in Stratford, Connecticut, just one day before her 72nd
birthday. Her character's death was written into the third season
story line of The Sopranos. Her husband of 48 years, actor Paul Sparer
had died the previous year, also from cancer.[citation needed] The
couple had three children: Katie, an actress, David (Rosebud), a
lawyer, and Rachel Sparer Bersier, an opera singer.[citation needed]
Marchand was posthumously inducted into the American Theatre Hall of
Fame.[4]
Filmography[edit]
Film[edit]

Screen Actors Guild Awards
Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series
Nominated

Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series
Won

2001
Nominated

References[edit]

^ "Nancy Marchand". FilmReference. 2010. Retrieved September 22,
2010.
^ Alumni
^ Garfield, David (1980). "Appendix: Life Members of The Actors Studio
as of January 1980". A Player's Place: The Story of The Actors Studio.
New York: Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc. p. 279.
ISBN 0-02-542650-8.
^ "Theater family comes together to celebrate Hall of Fame honorees".
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Retrieved February 12, 2014.